Super Frat

With an all star cast of really good actors and Michael Mann directing, Public Enemies sets the bar high and then dives underneath it.  The movie is a routine gangster movie that will probably end up on the history channel.  The biggest miss here is not in capturing John Dillinger’s legendary crimes, but why he was famous.  Dillinger robbed banks in the middle of the Depression and the average man made him a hero because of it.  Think about it.  Everyone you know lives on a farm and it’s being foreclosed, but there’s one guy out there thumbing his nose at the banks and never stealing from the little guy.  On that note, Mann fails to capture the era and put it in context.

Christian Bale plays Agent Purvis, the man who eventually caught Dillinger, but its kind of a thankless role that could’ve been given to any actor.  The most interesting performance is from Billy Crudup who plays a young, J. Edgar Hoover.  Hoover was obsessed with Dillinger and it was the cross dresser’s eventual overzealousness that created the FBI and the beginnings of the vast “War on Crime” and the ever-expanding federal law enforcement branches that we now have today.  It could’ve been a great metaphor for today’s Depression and today’s ever-expanding Homeland Security, but Mann just doesn’t think that big.  Putting Depp in cool clothes and cars seems to be enough for him.

Another key scene where Mann misses the boat is when Depp and his girlfriend are in a restaurant and everyone is “looking at them” because she’s in a “three dollar dress”.  The problem is, Depp and his girl are beautiful and the rest of the actors are just window dressing.  We don’t get a sense that “these people” are the rich who aren’t effected by the Depression and the couple doesn’t belong there.  Mann just doesn’t create the mood, he just has the characters say that’s the way it is.  I don’t know, maybe he’s out of his element.  Dillinger is not the same as cocaine smugglers in Miami Vice.  Without the context, Dillinger is just another gentlemen bank robber.

Another aspect too is that Dillinger Conspiracy.  Dillinger supposed used the alias of Jimmy Lawrence, a small time hood that resembled Dillinger.  Legend has it that it was Lawrence, not Dillinger that was killed.  In the early 60’s, an aging hood dying in prison claimed to be the real John Dillinger.  I’m not saying any of this is true, but if you’re going to exaggerate Dillinger’s love story, why not exaggerate some of these juicy details.

Bottom line, PE is run of the mill gangster stuff.  It’s an okay rental or for something you’ll half watch on a Sunday while playing video games or eating dinner.  50/50 chance you’ll watch it through to the end.  I give Public Enemies a 5 keggers out of 10.